Tag Archives: Overcoming Overeating

The Daily Grind: Sweet Madness

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In my recent work to “legalize food” (Overcoming Overeating) or trek through the “Donuts and Doritos” phase (Thin Side Out), I came to the realization that when I am physically hungry I rarely (almost never) want sweets, but my “mouth hunger” (OO)/ “non-hunger eating” (TSO) seriously wants some ice cream. I even went back to Baskin Robbins today to get three (count them… THREE!) quarts of my favorite ice cream so I would feel like I had plenty.

This paradox is such a rip-off! I hate when I clearly know that my body wants protein, or carbs, or veggies, but my diet monster wants ice cream. AHH! So, I ate some today, but of course my body feels unsatisfied because really, it wants what it was signaling. UGH!

I realize that feeding the whole self is important; that I need to find a way to satiate both my physical hunger and “mouth hunger.” I decided to take a cue from Overcoming Overeating and see if there is something that happened in my day that may have made me uncomfortable. I try to remember when I started to obsess about having ice cream…

Here’s the grind: …it was just after I got home for lunch. I had been taking photos for a special awards slideshow presentation. It is going to play while they discuss the program I was instrumental in creating as one of the reasons my division is receiving this fancy award. So far it’s great right?! Well, they tell me that they’d like to get some action photos. I say, “Okay, but that’s not what we do at all.” They don’t seem to care much. They just want generic photos of me interacting with the students. No one seems to care that the program I helped create isn’t being accurately represented. I care! This is the rub. This is why I start thinking about a mug of Baskin Robbins chocolate and peanut butter ice cream on my way home.

Of course it gets more complex…I’m hungry for lunch, which makes it seem easier, but physiologically I want protein and salad. I think, “Come on! Really?!”  …I eat ice cream. I am comforting myself and eating because I am hungry. I don’t feel satiated afterwards. No surprise there. I feel like overeating. That feeling of “no food can quite fill this hunger” is happening and I notice it. I go through the typical self battle about why I should or shouldn’t eat. I eat. I am angry and I don’t feel like I have a right to be, which makes me feel like I am “being dramatic,” so I eat. Sigh. Whether or not I’m in the right doesn’t matter. What matters is that I recognize why I am feeling compulsive. That perfectionist little pig-tailed rebel wants control over every situation and feels sorry for herself when she doesn’t have it. So, she wants an ice cream to comfort her. I have compassion for her so I feed her. Now I just need to find another way to soothe her. It’s a relief to discover the pathway because it helps me build a new one.

The Daily Grind: Eating Other People’s Emotions

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Today, I spend my day preparing my food for the week ahead. Throughout the day, I receive five phone calls from different close friends and family about serious circumstances; circumstances about health and relationships. I am a good friend. It is important to me to spend time talking to each of them.

Here’s the Grind: As I am listening to each one I realize that I am walking around my kitchen picking at the scones that are cooling on top of the stove. Then, I notice that I am standing at the refrigerator picking at the bowl of fresh berries. Then a bit later I open the bag of salt and vinegar chips in the pantry. I recognize that I am eating when I am not hungry at this point. What’s interesting to me, is that I didn’t notice when I was “testing” the scones or eating the “healthy” berries. I noticed when I was eating the chips.

Two things come to mind. First, clearly chips are still not “legal” in my mind. Second, my empathy for my loved ones creates a need for comfort or soothing, and clearly it is a kind of comfort/soothing that I don’t know how to give myself yet. So I turn to my old standard …eating. Next step: get some sleep and try to imagine what might soothe me besides food.

The Daily Grind: Baskin Robbins

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So …I’m at Baskin Robbins tonight because I am, once again, allowing myself to “legalize food” (Overcoming Overeating) or going through the “Donuts and Doritos” phase (Thin Side Out). I am hungry so I’m excited to eat this. I have been brain-craving it for a few days so I am finally going to give it to myself.

Here’s the grind:  When I walk in I see the waffle cones and really want one. I have a long debate with myself about getting it or not, and decide against it because if I get the waffle cone and the ice cream I am just going too far! The calories! The points! The fat! In other words… The diet! the diet! the diet! My diet monster is raging!!! But the little girl, who seems to represent me in these situations, is begging for that cone! I decide against it again. Boy that diet monster has muscle! And …once again I am denying her/myself. Somehow, I feel disappointed in the experience with this decision but at least I am still getting the ice cream.

Then a miracle happened.

My friend who is with me orders a sundae. A SUNDAE!!! WHAT?! I have a moment of bliss! I think… I could have a sundae! …whoa. Then I realize… I don’t want a sundae… I want a waffle cone!

but of course it can’t be that easy. The waffle cones are too big for my taste. I want one, but not that big. I think… “they are too big.” I must have said it out loud because the ice cream cashier asks me if I want a sugar cone because they are smaller. I then realize that I have said it allowed and she is just trying to help me get what I want. I feel a pressure to decide so she can get to her other customers. Then I remember that I don’t have to eat it all. I do have to manage the guilt I have about consciously ordering too much food that I can’t take home, but it is worth it to me to have what I want. I also realize that, actually, that guilt is serving another purpose as well. It is a recognition that my body has a clear sense of the amount of food I need to consume to feel satisfied.

So I do just that. I eat the ice cream cone until I am satisfied and then throw the rest away. Liberating. A little sad I have to toss the cone but it’s okay. Maybe next time I will bring the cone home, and keep it in a baggie and crush it with my next scoop. The curiosity I am cultivating is making me creative… hum… this is feeling pretty good.

Josie Spinardi’s book Thin Side Out

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I finished reading Josie Spinardi’s Thin Side Out: How to Have you Cake and Your Skinny Jeans Too. 

Here’s what I posted as a review on Amazon:

This book is like a bite-sized version of Overcoming Overeating (A LOT of her techniques are from this book- she just re-labels them- ie. “hunger directed eating” is “demand feeding”- not sure she’s read their work though, since she doesn’t credit them at all), also- Geneen Roth’s works (which she does credit), Intuitive Eating and a host of other books dedicated to kicking dieting to the curb and figuring out how to feed yourself from physiological signals again (or from your “thin-telligence” as she cutely terms it). It has been a while since I read any of the aforementioned books and I’ve sworn off dieting at least twice only to return to the pressure. I was hoping for a new perspective but only received a booster shot from the “diets don’t work” camp.
That being said, this book did inspire me to return to a diet-free/natural-path of feeding myself. The concepts presented aren’t new to anyone who’s been looking into this line of thinking for a while, but she did do a few interesting things that I found insightful including: reframing “non-hunger related eating” as a psychological symptom of dieting. I like how she consistently asks the reader to recognize that. Though others have exposed this, she cuts to the chase about it in a fun and personal way, and works to build your confidence; reminding you that you can, in fact, figure it out. Thanks Josie!
I find this journey to be intensely personal, which this book shows but doesn’t address, and while reading it was inspiring and served as a well-intentioned reminder to trust my body, it didn’t give me a lot of new “how to” tools as I had hoped. I’m a fan of finding things that motivate me so I recommend this book.
I gave it four stars because it’s only available on kindle as mentioned by a ton of other reviewers- … but also because so much of this book was a condensed appropriation of many other people’s work that she presents as some kind of revolutionary thinking.
Overall- if you’re new to the “stop dieting” discourse this will give you an overview and inspire you to go for it. If you’d like a quirky booster shot that’s a quick read- this will do it the trick. It’s definitely geared toward the upper middle class (as suggested by a different viewer) but the basic concepts are useful to think about for a majority of readers.